South Tyneside

We review the electoral and boundary arrangements of councils to make sure they are fair. Our reviews include at least two rounds of public consultation before we make recommendations for change. 

We are carrying out an electoral review of South Tyneside Council because it has been a long time since the last review.

Consultation on Proposals

Following concerns with the electorate figures published on our website, on 22 March 2024 the Commission wrote to South Tyneside Council confirming its intention to delay publication of the ‘Final Recommendations on the new electoral arrangements for South Tyneside’.

New Draft Recommendations were published on 7 May 2024, with a 10 week consultation originally running until 15 July 2024, this was extended to 9 September due to the General Election. 

During the draft recommendations consultation, a number of respondents observed that the electorate figures in the ‘South Tyneside electoral forecasting proforma’ file published on our website showed the incorrect electorate totals and variances for some of the existing wards. Some respondents queried whether, had the correct figures been shown, changes to some existing wards would have been necessary.

In addition to this error, the same file also was missing 264 electors that are forecast in the development of the Cleadon Lane Industrial Estate in Cleadon & East Boldon ward by 2029. 

We apologise that the figures in this file on our website showed incorrect electorates and variances for the existing wards. The correct figures are now available.

While the figures published on the website were incorrect, our draft recommendations were developed using the correct figures, and the information in our draft recommendations report published in October 2023 is accurate. 

However, we were aware that, with the incorrect figures on our website from the start of our initial consultation, respondents may have responded differently to our consultation had the correct figures and variances been available to them.

In light of this, we published New Draft Recommendations on 7 May 2024. These have been developed taking into account everything that we’ve heard in the submissions we have received to date – from both the warding patterns consultation and the consultation on the original draft recommendations

We will now publish our final recommendations on 1 October 2024. 

Visit our 'How reviews work' pages for more information on the review process.